Cẩm nang tổ chức sự kiện

Việc lập kế hoạch chu đáo cần được thực hiện đối với tất cả các sự kiện mà người phát ngôn báo chí sẽ tham dự, nhưng đặc biệt đối với những sự kiện như chuyến thăm của nguyên thủ quốc gia hoặc cuộc họp của một vài bộ trưởng ngoại giao.Bước đầu tiên là chỉ định một giám đốc phụ trách toàn bộ sự kiện.
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Cẩm nang tổ chức sự kiện Why is coordination important? For one, it ensures that a program will get off to a good start. Former White House press secretary Marlin Fitzwater asked the communications directors of each cabinet department to report all announcements they felt could make front page news. He did it with the idea that the president could announce some of each department's major news and that he would know about any controversial news before it happened. Second, someone in another ministry or department could be working on the same program or issue and could be at cross-purposes. The press could rightly ask: If a governmental leader can't keep two ministries on the same track on the same issue, and if two ministries can't work together, just how good a leader or minister is he or she? Third, even when two government officials agree on an issue, combining their efforts will make a message stronger. Fourth, you might be surprised and embarrassed if others' efforts are publicized by the press and you don't know about it. In one instance, a cabinet official announced a major initiative without clearing it with the White House. While the policy announcement received much media attention, its reversal by the president received even more. The cabinet official was left embarrassed and was portrayed as having been undermined in the press. Finally, just exchanging the calendars of government officials is not enough. The press and public affairs offices should coordinate their plans as well. When government agencies schedule major press conferences at the same time, journalists have complained loudly. 'Which press conference are we supposed to pick?' one reporter complained to a spokesperson. 'Don't make our job so hard.' The U.S. military, by contrast, emphasizes message coordination. Daily, near the conclusion of the work day, U.S. Navy public affairs offices around in the world e-mail to the Navy's central public affairs office in Washington a rundown of major media inquiries and newsworthy events for that day. The central office summarizes the major inquiries and issues, and e-mails this back to the public affairs offices. The spokespersons contact each other on common issues and coordinate their answers. 'This prevents the press from 'double teaming' by going to various parts of the Navy and trying to get us to say different things,' says one spokesperson. 'Very often I have found the same reporter called a colleague in a different city with similar questions. Knowing about all the major press activity allows me and my colleagues to coordinate our answers so we don't appear in conflict, and it helps us understand what angle a reporter may really be taking in a story.' Officials in many coalition governments complain that coordination is impossible because there are representatives of widely different political parties in key positions throughout a government. This hurdle does not belie the fact that coordination is just as essential in a coalition government as it is in a winner-take-all election. THE COMMUNICATIONS PLAN • The Message Starts With the Leader • Creating a Communications Plan • Working Out a Media Campaign The first step in successfully communicating with the public is developing a plan for getting out your message. Your message is your theme with an objective, such as to persuade someone to do something or to support something. It is capturing your ideas in a way that can be understood and accepted by others. For example, if you want citizens to pay lower taxes, your message might be about cutting taxes to stimulate the economy. Why not just throw out this message to the public and let it take its course? Because, chances are you won't get anywhere if you do. You wouldn't get into your car and drive without knowing where you were going, what roads you were going to take, what you were going to do when you got there, and whom you wanted to see when you arrived. That would be a waste of time, effort, and gasoline. You need to plan where you are headed and how you will get there - and even what will happen if you have an accident in your car or a mishap in your plan. This is also true in developing a message, putting it into a communications plan, devising a media campaign to carry it out, and assessing the strategy as you implement it. If you don't know how to get to where you want to go, you won't get there. If you want to make economic changes in the way the government is run, for instance, you need to communicate why you are proposing what you want to do, what effect it will have and on whom, how much it will cost or how much it will save, how you will know whether or not the program reaches its goals, and how long it will take to do so. The communications plan is your map to reach your destination; the media campaign represents the roads to get there. The Message Starts With the Leader The government public affairs/press office plans and implements a media campaign, but that can be done only when the government leader is on board and has presented clear goals. Developing goals and themes does not rest with the press office. Ideally, the top official, working with his press secretary and senior staff, has articulated three to five objectives or themes that he or she would like to accomplish long term — say, by the end of the year or the end of his or her term in office. (More than five major themes can be too much for the public to absorb.) As an example, these are five that one recently democratized state considered: advance European Union reforms, achieve military reforms to get closer to NATO membership, achieve civil service reforms, achieve privatization goals, push through agricultural reforms. The themes should be articulated repeatedly and made a focal point of the administration. As much as possible, every action the official takes — from delivering a speech, to giv ...